


You Should Come Around More, Alabama

by meretricula



Category: Hart of Dixie
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 19:04:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/601091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meretricula/pseuds/meretricula
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While George is in New York City, Lemon finds companionship in an unlikely place. (Pre-show, friendship fic unless you squint.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Should Come Around More, Alabama

**Author's Note:**

  * For [singsongsung](https://archiveofourown.org/users/singsongsung/gifts).



_it might just be the right time for you and me  
(but to be honest it's probably not)_

 

There were two types of people in Bluebell, Alabama: the kind who left, and the kind who stayed. Lemon might not have liked much about Wade Kinsella, but there was no denying that he wasn't the leaving type. At first that was something of a black mark on his character, given how his lack of ambition and role as George Tucker's disreputable appendage all through high school could have combined to hold George back -- Lemon had high ambitions for George Tucker, after all. But once George was gone to New York City, fulfilling all _his_ ambitions and leaving Lemon behind, there was something to be said for having Wade Kinsella lurking around town, every bit as abandoned as she was and nine times as pathetic. 

Not that Lemon was competing with Wade Kinsella on any imaginable level, mind. She simply took comfort in any reliable source of schadenfreude, and it didn't come much more reliable than the town's resident man-child and his ongoing descent into alcoholism and venereal disease. 

"Lemon Breeland, as I live and breathe," came the predictable drawl, accompanied by an even more predictable sneer. "What brings your royal highness to our humble establishment?" 

"You may bring me a white wine spritzer," Lemon said, paying Wade's question precisely the amount of attention it deserved, which was to say none. "And then you may refrain from addressing me for the rest of the night." 

"Princess, it's not like I've been pining away for your conversation," Wade said. Lemon didn't deign to watch as he worked his way back down the bar to pour her glass of wine, but she didn't have to in order to know his eyes were rolling as hard as they could without falling out of his head. "Your drink, majesty." Annoyingly, it was excellent. Despite his myriad faults, Wade knew what he was doing behind the bar. 

"And the thing is," Lemon announced to the bar at large, after a multitude of white wine spritzers had mysteriously materialized in front of her to replace the first and been just as summarily consumed. "The thing is, George Tucker is an ass." 

" _Oh_ -kay, princess," Wade said as he ducked under the pass-through of the bar. Lemon blinked, and in the space between her eyes closing and opening again he had appeared at her side. "I think that's enough for you. SHELLY! CAN YOU TAKE LEMON HOME?" That last question was not, Lemon deduced, directed at her, but given that she was mentioned in it she nevertheless felt that she was entitled to answer. 

"I'm not going home! I'm staying right -- here," she declared, the dignity of her reply only slightly marred by a mid-sentence pause to recover from a wobble on her barstool. "Fetch me another white wine spritzer, barkeep!" 

"You really, really don't need one." 

"None of your business," Lemon said, reverting to childhood. Fighting with Wade Kinsella: it was like elementary school all over again. "So shut up, stupidhead." 

"Wow, ouch, I'm so hurt." Wade clutched at his heart for a moment before turning back to the bar. "Actually, Shelly, can you cover for me for the rest of the night? I think I'm going to have to wrestle her home. She fights meaner than snakebite." 

"Do what you have to do," said the other bartender, who was new in town and who Lemon decided on the spot she didn't like. "Take pictures!" 

"I am _not_ going home," Lemon repeated as Wade unceremoniously lifted her off her stool and dragged her out of the bar towards his truck. "I told you -- put me down, you Neanderthal! -- I _told_ you, so let me go! Wade Kinsella, I will have you up on _charges_ , have you forgotten who my father is in this town -- " 

"Just shut up and put your seatbelt on, princess," Wade sighed. "Or else I'll do it for you, and neither of us is going to enjoy it." 

Lemon folded her hands in her lap and glared. "No." 

"Don't say I didn't warn you -- "

"Stop it!" Lemon shrieked, batting frantically at him, and Wade paused with his body already half-bent over her and the seatbelt in his hand. "I _can't_ go home, you idiot, I can't let Daddy and Magnolia see me like this. Are you _stupid_?" To her boundless humiliation, she heard her voice crack. Wade let the seatbelt go and straightened up, raking his free hand through his hair. 

"Look," he said at last. "I won't take you back to Brick's place if you don't want, but you can't stay at the Rammer Jammer drinking white wine spritzers all night. For one, you're liable to get alcohol poisoning if you keep at it much longer, and if you think your daddy won't notice getting woke up in the middle of the night to attend to an ambulance you're stupider than you look. Don't you have any friends to stay with? Most of your pals from high school are still in town." 

"If I wanted them to see me drunk and sloppy, don't you think I'd have been drinking somewhere other than your filthy dive bar?" Lemon sniffed. "Honestly, Wade." 

"Right, of course, I forgot you don't have _friends_ , just minions to do your perfect bidding. Ugh, fine. Just buckle up and keep quiet, would you? I can't believe I'm doing this," he muttered as he rounded the truck and got into the driver's seat. 

"I'm not going back home," Lemon said stubbornly. 

"You only said about a thousand times, do I look deaf? Shut the door, princess, I'm taking you home with me. I'd let you drown in your own puke if it was up to me, but George'd probably be pissed if you died." 

"And George Tucker is an _ass_ ," Lemon added with great satisfaction at having rediscovered her original thesis. 

"Okay, now how about you shut your door and buckle your seatbelt, and you can tell me all about how much an ass George Tucker is while we drive home?" 

Lemon spent the entire drive enumerating the many, many ways in which George Tucker fell short of the ideal mate, and could have kept going even if Wade had lived all the way over in Mobile, but his worst flaw didn't come out until she was settled in Wade's filthy house on his ratty, disgusting couch. There was a glass of water in her hands that she hadn't asked for, and she looked down at it with disfavor before glancing back at Wade, who had sprawled out next to her with a beer and a total lack of respect for her personal space. "He likes New York," Lemon said, struggling to sound unruffled and failing. "Even though I'm not there." 

"I know," Wade said. He took a deep, reflective gulp of beer. "It does pretty much suck, getting left behind." 

She reached for the usual arsenal of insults -- George hadn't left _her_ , not really, not forever, and anyway she was George's girlfriend, not his sad sack of a high school best friend, so who did Wade think he was comparing them -- and then let it go. "What if he doesn't want to come back?" she asked, finally voicing the fear she would deny to her dying breath to her father, her friends, and every last gossipmonger in Bluebell, Alabama. 

"Dunno." Wade put his arm around her, cautiously, and relaxed back against the couch when she didn't react one way or the other. "Reckon he will, though." 

"You do?" 

"Yeah." 

"Okay." It was only Wade Kinsella, but his (unqualified, moronic) opinion was more reassuring than all the lists Lemon had made of why Bluebell was a better place to live than New York City. Lemon let herself relax just the tiniest bit, enough to rest her head against Wade's shoulder and shut her eyes. 

* 

When Lemon woke up the next morning, her temples were pounding fit to burst and her mouth tasted like something had died there during the night. None of that was nearly as bad as the realization that she'd been sleeping on Wade Kinsella's couch, on top of Wade Kinsella. 

"Christ Jesus," Wade moaned. He'd rolled off the couch at her first shriek and lay there without making any effort to get up, clutching his head. 

"No one can know about this," Lemon hissed. She got down on her knees for a better angle and stabbed her finger into Wade's chest. " _No one_ , do you hear me, Wade Kinsella?" 

"Nothing _happened_ , you lunatic harpy!" 

"Exactly," Lemon said. "We didn't do anything, we didn't say anything, as far as I'm concerned last night is a big blank space of _nothing happened_ and it'd better be the same for you. And that's the way it's going to stay. Now get up," she added, getting to her feet. "You're giving me a ride into town."


End file.
